Drunken breast-feeding arrest touches off debate

JAMES MacPHERSON

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) -- Police responding to a domestic
disturbance arrived at Stacey Anvarinia's home to find the mother
breast-feeding her 6-week-old baby in front of them. And she was
drunk, they said.

Officers arrested the woman, who later pleaded guilty to child
neglect and faces up to five years in prison. Now her case has
touched off a debate among moms about breast-feeding, alcohol --
and privacy.

Since Anvarinia's arrest, blogs have been abuzz with comments
questioning whether breast-feeding mothers could risk criminal
charges if they drink even modest amounts. Authorities insist
police were right to make the arrest, even if the mother had not
been breast-feeding, out of concern for the child's welfare.

"Since when is breast-feeding while drunk a crime?" said Dr. Amy
Tuteur, a retired obstetrician and gynecologist in Boston who has
been following the case on her Web site, the Skeptical OB.

If the 26-year-old woman had been bottle-feeding her baby, "no
one would have bothered to check what was in the bottle," Tuteur
said. "You can do a lot more damage by mixing formula wrong."

Medical research on alcohol and breast-feeding is murky, mainly
because the issue is difficult to study. Researchers cannot
ethically conduct controlled research on intoxicated women who
breast-feed. So doctors rely on anecdotal evidence.

The breast-feeding advocacy group La Leche League International
advises women to nurse their children only when "completely
sober."

In published advice to mothers, the group says: "Drinking to the
point of intoxication, or binge drinking, by breast-feeding mothers
has not been adequately studied. Since all of the risks are not
understood, drinking to the point of intoxication is not
advised."

The American Academy of Pediatrics says excessive alcoholconsumption by a breast-feeding mother can lead to drowsiness, deepsleep, weakness and abnormal weight gain in an infant.

Dr. Lori Feldman-Winter, who helps oversee breast-feeding policy
for the American Academy of Pediatrics, said the group considers
limited alcohol consumption compatible with breast-feeding.

"A mother who becomes intoxicated should not breast-feed," said
Winter, who also heads the division of adolescent medicine at
Cooper University Hospital in Camden, N.J. "After drinking one
glass of wine, a woman should abstain from breast-feeding for two
to three hours."

La Leche, which knew of no similar cases to Anvarinia's, says
the effect on a baby is directly related to how much the mother
drinks.

In general, "Feed the baby first, and then wait until it leaves
your bloodstream," McCallister said.

The group says it takes up to three hours for one serving of
beer or wine to be eliminated from the body of a 120-pound
woman.

Melissa Peat, a mother of three in Topeka, Kan., said she has
had an "occasional beer or glass of wine" while breast-feeding.
Peat said the topic of alcohol and breast milk comes up in
conversations with other mothers.

"The conventional wisdom among breast-feeding mothers is that
alcohol, coffee, spicy food - everything in moderation is
acceptable for the breast-feeding mom," said Peat, 32, a former
high school math and science teacher who now is a stay-at-home
mom.

Arrests involving intoxicated breast-feeding mothers have been
difficult to prosecute.

The city of Bethel, Alaska, paid two women $2,500 apiece in 1992
to settle a lawsuit they filed over their arrest on charges of
endangering their children by drinking alcohol before
breast-feeding. The women had been charged with misdemeanor
reckless endangerment in 1990, but prosecutors later dropped the
charges, saying no crime had been committed.

It's unclear how much Anavarina had to drink. Police never
conducted a blood-alcohol test. Investigators believed she was
drunk, and her arrest on a charge of child abuse and neglect did
not require a test.

"The majority of our problems are caused by alcohol," said Grand
Forks Police Capt. Kerwin Kjelstrom. "Our officers handle it so
much that it is pretty much a general knowledge thing to know when
someone is intoxicated. It's pretty obvious."

When police came to the home on April 13, Anvarinia, who had a
criminal record, told them that she had been assaulted by her
boyfriend. A police report said she had swelling on her nose and
chin and a small scratch on her left cheek.

The boyfriend was not home and has not been charged, and
authorities have not said who has custody of the child. Anvarinia's
court-appointed attorney, David Ogren, did not return repeated
telephone calls.

Authorities insist the woman's decision to breast-feed was not
the only factor in her arrest.

"This case is more than just the breast-feeding. It was the
totality of the circumstances," said Grand Forks Police Lt. Rahn
Farder. "It is quite unusual for a mother to be breast-feeding her
child as we are conducting an investigation, whether she was
intoxicated or not."